PBEM AAR - It Ain't a Lost Cause Yet!

[Gil R.]

Another thing I do is take some of the infantry brigades out of the ANV and use them to garrison the forts in Fredericksburg. Since that province has no city, it cannot have Hospitals, and therefore the army cannot spend the winter there without risking severe problems. If a few garrisons get disease that's okay, but I can't afford for the army to be hit. So, before I can send the ANV to James River, where I'll build a Hospital, I remove three brigades and a division container and put them in Fort Evans. Now if the Union tries to invade Fredericksburg there will be enough garrisons to hold them off, while the ANV (and District of the Potomac corps) will be just a province away.

[Gil R.]

And now the Army of Northern Virginia heads to winter quarters outside of Richmond...

[Gil R.]

...and this is what Virginia will look like for the winter, unless there's trouble. (And if there is trouble, I'm well positioned to deal with it quickly. I'd love to have more railroads, though. Maybe if my blockade-runner gets the 50 Iron I'll build up my RR infrastructure.)

[Gil R.]

Now comes time to start building. Since the odds of fighting in winter are very small, I'm going to devote all resources to building new buildings. I have greatest need for: hospitals (for reasons described above), research institutions (to start advancing me in logistics, weaponry, tactics, etc.), railroad infrastructure (so I have the flexibility to move my forces quickly in the defense of any province), camps (which reinforce my brigades by each distributing 500 men per turn to a certain number of brigades), and finally, more mints and mines (to add to my Money and Iron income).

I begin the turn with 98 Money, 74 Labor, 42 Iron, and 167 Horses, and plan to maximize these resources. (I also have 31 Guns, but plan to stockpile this and buy myself something special, instead of just a bunch of Minie rifle.)

My top priority is a Hospital in Richmond, so that the Army of Northern Virginia won't be devastated by disease. That costs 40 Labor, and takes two turns to build. If I'm lucky, disease will hit elsewhere in the meantime.

After spending the 40 Labor, I will then spend 20 Labor and 100 Horses for a Camp in Wilmington. Once this is ready in two turns I'll receive 500 extra reinforcements for my brigades each turn. Since some of my brigades are more than 2000 below capacity, I'll need a lot of Camps to get my army to an acceptable size. Luckily, the South produces a lot of Horses, so I should be able to build a new Camp every 2-3 turns. (Here I have an advantage over the Union, which produces fewer Horses.)

[Gil R.]

At this point, I still have all 98 Money left, but am down to 14 Labor, 42 Iron and 67 Horses. Since research institutions take six turns to build and then take many more turns before the provide enough research points for an upgrade, I better start working on this area. As you can see, I can afford any one of the six types. Each costs 75 Money, but they vary between 30 Iron and 30 Horses. But I realize that if I purchase an Armory (+3 weapons research), and Engineering School (+3 engineering research), or a Naval College (+3 naval research) that will be all I can afford to build this turn. But if I instead expend horses, I can get a War College (+3 tactics research) or a Laboratory (+3 logistics research). Since I already have four War Colleges, I decide to build a Laboratory.

Now, what I build is important, but so is where I build it. Two cities, Milledgeville, Georgia and Raleigh, N.C., have a University, which tacks on an additional +1 research point each turn. If one is going to build a research institution, it makes sense to do it in one of these cities and get +4 rather than +3 in that area of research. So, I build it in Milledgeville.

After I've done this, the only thing I can build is a Mint (10 Labor, 30 Iron), which will give me +2 Money each turn once it's done. I build it, and have gotten as much as I could have from my resources.

[Gil R.]

Finally, one last move. Before the Union's fleets arrive, I move some naval vessels from Mobile Bay to New Orleans, where I have a shipyard. If ever I can afford to, I'll build a fleet in the shipyard, and those ships can be added. So, it makes sense to relocate them now, when it's safe for them to hit the open waters.

[Gil R.]

I now hit "End Turn" and get to promote another 4-Star general, so I choose Stonewall Jackson.

I then get to order my Raiders and Partisans to bother that Union army again, so I have my Raiders steal weapons (thus adding to my Guns stockpile), and tell my Partisans to destroy the enemy's supplies -- just in case it has its eyes on Memphis.

And with that, the files get e-mailed...

[Hard Sarge]

Don't forget to set your supply levels for the Divs

or you trying to live off the land ?

[Gil R.]

Actually, I did some of that in the turn I'm about to post but didn't take screenshots, since I figured I'd do so another time. Essentially, I'm keeping every division on "low" supply because it's winter and they're already nearly at capacity and they're unlikely to fight. But in the case of that division of three brigades I stuck in Ft. Evans and the division in Shenandoah I am having them forage, thus saving myself about 5 Money. I'll probably make more changes in the next turn.

[Gil R.]

Third Turn

This turn was quick and pretty boring. In addition to making those minor changes in supply -- the rules for which I'll explain if I'm informed that jchastain didn't do so in his thread -- I built some stuff, and that's about it.

First, here's a screenshot of the first half of the Events Report. Note that my Raiders unit was destroyed. I now will need to build another, but that costs 100 Horses and I need those to make more Camps and get more reinforcements. For now, that's my priority, but if this were summer I'd go with Raiders so as to do harm to the enemy.

[Gil R.]

And here's the second half of the report. Note that the corps I had just moved to Lynchburg got nailed by disease -- I should have moved them to Petersburg instead, I guess. Fortunately, the casualties weren't too high, and the lowered disposition of the units will be fixed by spring if I build a hospital there (as I've been planning to do). Also note that another fleet of blockade-runners took damage, but not as much as the other did in the last turn.

[Gil R.]

My good relations with Europe are paying off, as an extremely rich assortment of runners' goods pops up. These are my options: 70 Iron (70-20), 50 Weapons (80-20), 30 Horses (50-10), 40 Horses (80-40), 60 Iron (80-20), 10 Labor (60-30), or 10 Money (70-30). I decide to go after the 70+60 Iron, since I have very good odds of doing so safely, and that take would represent triple my production of 38/turn.

If I'm lucky, those 50 Weapons will still be there in the next turn.

I really should repair the damage the runners have been taking, but I can't turn down these opportunities. Plus, I have the dilemma of whether to invest 150 Money -- which could buy two research institutions, or help pay for three new infantry brigades or either an artillery or cavalry brigade, not to mention numerous cheaper things -- to build a third fleet of runners.

[Gil R.]

Finally, I making my building decisions. I start the turn with 79 Money, 68 Labor, 50 Iron, 114 Horses, and 116 Guns. It's tempting to use the Guns resources to put some 10-inch Rodmans in one of my crucial forts, but I'm gambling that, it being winter, I can wait another turn or two to do so, since those Rodmans also take up Money and Iron.

Instead, my priority is still building up my economy, military and research efforts, so I start building another Mine in Augusta to get me +4 Iron (40 Labor), a Camp (20 Labor, 100 Horses), and an Engineering School (75 Money, 30 Iron). Unfortunately, Milledgeville and Raleigh, where the bonus-giving University buildings are located, are both filled with buildings now, so I can't build more research institutions there until I either build a Mansion (costs 100 Money, supports four new buildings) or a Plantation (costs 50 Labor and 50 Horses, but also produces +1 Money or +2 Labor, depending on which is chosen, and +2 Horses). Plantations take 12 turns to build but Mansions just take four. I can't spare the resources for either right now, so any more research institutions I build for the next several turns must go where I don't get a University's +1 bonus.

This leaves me with with 4 Money, 8 Labor, 20 Iron, and 14 Horses, which can buy me nothing.

Nothing else happened in this turn, other than promoting Gen. Sibley to 3-star status and having my Partisans try to sabotage a railroad in order to prevent Union movements. (Sabotaging the railroad does not target a particular province, but rather takes away from the global pool of RR movement points, which can cause a Union army to be unable to follow an order to move by rail somewhere. Thus, if done on the right turn, it can really mess with the enemy's plans.)

Here's a screenshot of Atlanta's development screen, showing how little research (represented by yellow light bulbs, which weren't invented yet I just realized) I have so far. In a few turns when my two new research institutions are completed you'll start to see a lot more yellow there, and by early summer at the latest I'll have my first upgrades.

[Gil R.]

Fourth Turn

On we go. Here's the first half of the Events List. Note that Wheeling will soon fall. I've decided to let it fall -- it's winter, so my odds of moving an army there are very small, and even if it gets there I'd probably be defeated. It's best to keep my forces intact and lose that one city and the income it represents.

Also, as you can see, I just got Hardee and Magruder, both very good generals when playing with historical ratings.

[Gil R.]

And here's the lower half. Note that disease just hit Fredericksburg, but only affected the fort garrisons. If I had left my Army of Northern Virginia there, it would have gone from 100,000 men down to around 85,000. As Letterman says, "There is no 'off' position on the genius switch."

Sadly but not unexpectedly, Kentucky randomly decided to go with the Union. (Since I'm not a conspiracy theorist, I will not blame this on Diebold.) (Random, unrelated political observation: we will not be hearing nearly the volume of complaints about Diebold over the next two years that we have been hearing over the last two.) Right now, Kentucky is virtually undefended by the Union, but I know from experience that my forces nearby are insufficient to take it. If I tried to besiege Lexington, Louisville or Frankfort the garrisons there would kill thousands of my troops -- and that's before the nearby Union forces even showed up! I'm going to stay the course and spend the beginning of the game putting myself on a war-footing, instead of risking the war in a foolish attempt to capture Kentucky.

That said, I might produce some more Raiders and Partisans and see if I can cause economic damage there. I don't want the Union to get all those Horses!

[Gil R.]

On to what I do with my resources. My blockade-runners in the last turn successfully picked up all that Iron, so my starting resources stockpiles are: 67 Money, 78 Labor, 188 Iron (!), 91 Horses, and 147 Guns.

Before I spend that, I first decide what to do with my runners this turn. One of them can reach 30 Horses or 45 Weapons, and I go after the Horses because my odds of damage are less (50%-10% vs. 60%-30%). My other runner fleet, which took a lot of damage recently, is only in range of small amounts of money or horses that have high risk of further damage, so I’m using this turn to send it to the shipyard at New Orleans for repairs. If I can strengthen it over the next turn or two I stand less of a chance of losing it.

So, on to the purchases. I first build a hospital in Lynchburg (40 Labor), where I have fifteen divisions in the District of the Potomac. I need to protect them from disease, since it's still winter. As for the Iron, there are so many things I could do with it, and to me the most important is building up my railroad infrastructure. So, I build Railroad Stations in Charleston and New Orleans (10 Labor, 50 Iron each), which will give me an additional 5 railroad movement points when they're done in six turns. This will give me the ability to move a division of five brigades three provinces -- not nearly enough, but a start. (Since my goal for 1862 is to fight a defensive war and hold on to my territory, rapid mobility is of paramount importance.)

Regarding that corps in Lynchburg, it's time to make a significant change that is of great importance. At the end of the last turn, I promoted Gen. Sibley (stationed near Memphis) to three-stars, making him qualified to command a corps. Unfortunately, I start the game with only three corps (all in the ANV) and insufficient infrastructure or resources to produce a new one, so I remove the three divisions that are in the District of the Potomac in Lynchburg and send that corps container out to Memphis, where I put the two divisions there into it and rename it the Army of Tennessee, since I expect it to be doing most of its fighting there. (Remember, divisions, corps and armies are only container units with no troops until one puts brigades in them. So I’ve sent just an empty container unit. In a few turns I’ll produce a new corps container in Richmond.)

Here's a screenshot of the new "army." (Those Lynchburg divisions will sit there until it's time to fold most of them into the ANV's two corps, or create a new corps container for them.)

[Gil R.]

I now want to spend some of my Guns stockpile and remaining Iron on one of my forts, which need superior artillery to hold off enemy sieges. My first choice would be Ft. Henry (look for it in Kentucky, just east of Paducah), but since Kentucky has joined the Union I cannot do that -- one of the game's fundamental rules is that units (and forts count as units) cannot be upgraded in any way while enemies are around, and now that my fort is in an enemy-controlled province I can't upgrade it until I take back that province. So, Ft. Henry will have to hold out with just its garrison and the rifle pits I bought earlier.

I consider buying the artillery for one of those forts in Fredericksburg, but I know that with the ANV a province away that province is still reasonably safe from capture, so I buy a 10-inch Rodman, the best fort artillery available, for Island No. 10, which is my best fort on the Mississippi River. Island No. 10 now has a garrison of 12,000 men, rifle pits (+50% damage caused by my garrison) and breastwork (reduces siege damage by 25%). It's going to be very tough for the Union to take it now. And in a month or two, I plan to buy a Rodman for another one of the forts in this province.

[Gil R.]

Now I'm going to do something novel with my strategic supply. Since we're playing with advanced rules, every brigade has an upkeep cost, which means that I have less money to spend. I always like to keep all of my divisions/corps/armies at "Low Supply," since this keeps them battle-ready, and also allows them to receive reinforcements from Camps (which doesn't happen with the "No Supply" setting.) But the following occurs to me: all of the brigades in my ANV and those three divisions in Lynchburg are in pretty good shape and not as desperate for reinforcements as my western divisions, so if I set the forces in Lynchburg and Richmond on "No Supply" I will save a lot of Money and can increase the odds that the 3000 reinforcements each turn will be put into those western brigades (which will be in the thick of the fighting by spring). The brigades in those two Virginia cities currently have enough supply to last four turns before they reach critically low levels, so that's four turns of extra income and greater reinforcement levels for other brigades. (Note that I would NEVER do this in summer, when I need to keep the ANV fully supplied at all times, but in winter it's almost certain that the ANV will not be fighting.)

Overall, there are 15 brigades in Lynchburg's three divisions and 27 in the ANV. Here's a screenshot of the latter.

[Gil R.]

The Nation Screen lets one track all income and expenditures. Take a look at "Infantry Upkeep" and "Net Income" on the left. These are the levels before I stop supplying those forces.

[Gil R.]

And here's how it looks after. That's 32 Money extra to spend for the next 3-4 turns!

I will, of course, monitor those Virginia forces to make sure that none of them is reaching a critical supply level.